What Your Tenants Home Insurance Doesn’t Cover What Your Tenants Home Insurance Doesn’t Cover
When you buy tenants home insurance for the first time or switch your policy to a new company, knowing what is not covered by your policy is just as important as knowing what is covered. Before you sign on the dotted line, be sure to think about whether or not you have items and situations like these that need to be covered. Here are a few examples of things that commonly go uncovered and unnoticed in renter’s insurance policies.
One of the things that insurance for renters often doesn’t cover is particularly valuable items, such as original pieces of art, expensive collections, and jewelry. If you have any of these things that you’ll be taking to your rented home or apartment, then you need to talk to an insurance agent about adding what is called a rider policy to your insurance. Basically, this is a policy specifically for the expensive items that gets tacked onto your renter’s insurance policy so that these other items are covered in the event of a theft or disaster.
Usually, there will be a policy about how much money in your insurance can be devoted to things like jewelry. Since most people have at least some of valuables like these, the typical policy will cover them up to a certain dollar amount. It’s important to actually know this dollar amount and to spend some time assessing how much your jewelry is actually worth. If you can’t remember what you paid for things or if you received them as gifts, take them to get appraised. It might seem crass, especially if you’re talking about a gift, but it will help you make sure that you can replace that item with a similar one if it should ever be stolen or perish in a fire or other disaster.
Speaking of other disasters, it’s important to realize that many tenants home insurance policies don’t actually cover flooding, especially, ironically, in areas that are flood zones. Basically, if your area is likely to flood often, the insurance company won’t take the risk of insuring your property against something that is likely to wipe out a lot of your personal property on a semi-regular basis. In order to get flood insurance coverage, you’ll have to work through a government organization, most likely. However, most renter’s insurance does cover minor flooding caused by leaky pipes and things of that sort.
